Easy Jam

It looks like being a funny old summer for fruit. We could blame the weird weather, I guess or we can be thankful for what little there is and make jam.

Yesterday, while hacking back the shrubbery, I noticed that the blueberry did have some fruit that the birds hadn't noticed so after all the shredding and sweeping up was finished, I fetched a bowl from the kitchen to see what berries I could harvest.

I came back to the kitchen with around 300g of blackcurrants, blueberries, raspberries, and a couple of alpine strawberries. (Had it all been raspberries, I admit they probably wouldn't have made it as far as the back porch.)

Time to make some jam.  This method is so quick that taking step by step photos would have more than doubled the effort. What follows is not so much a recipe but more like guidelines for quick, simple and delicious jam - ideal if:

• you have never made jam before
• you only have a small quantity of fruit or it doesn't match up with any recipe you have
• you haven't got a lot of jars
• you don't have a preserving pan - or can't be bothered hauling it out of the back of the cupboard
• you don't eat a lot of jam 
• you want some special jam for a special afternoon tea.

You will need some berry fruit and some sugar. I used jam sugar because I had some lurking in the larder and with the extra pectin in it, I could expect it to set firmly, but you could use ordinary granulated sugar.

 What you need to do 

1. Pop 2 or 3 teaspoons in the freezer. These come in handy to test to see if the jam will set later on.
2. Wash the fruit in a colander or sieve and gently shake the excess water away. Pick it over to remove anything you wouldn't want to eat - stalks, stems, leaves, damaged fruit.
3. Weigh the fruit at this stage.
4. Place the fruit in a saucepan over a gentle heat and let it simmer, stirring occasionally until it is soft. This will take five to ten minutes depending on how much fruit you have.
5. Weigh off the sugar - an amount equal to the weight of the fruit.
6. Take the pan off the heat and stir in the sugar until it is all dissloved.
7. Put the pan back on the heat and turn it up higher to bring the jam to the boil. Keep stirring it - unless, of course, you want it to boil over and make a sticky mess!
8. After a couple of minutes of boiling, start testing it to see if it will set. Take one of the teaspoons from the freezer and dip it into the jam to coat the spoon. Push your finger through the jam, along the bowl of the spoon. If the mixture wrinkles up in front of your finger and you find it leaves a clear trail behind it, then your jam is ready. If it is still too runny to do this then boil it a minute or two longer and try the cold spoon test again. (It is a good idea to take the pan off the heat while you do this, partly to stop it overcooking but mainly because your attention will be elsewhere for a few seconds and boiling jam has a habit of doing undesirable things if it is not watched.)
9. If you have jars and a lot of jam then bottle it up making sure the jars have been sterilized and heated before ladling in the jam - but this method is about small quantities so most of the time I just spoon it into a pretty jar or bowl to put on the tea table. Give it time to cool and set and then tuck in. It tastes so much better than all but the most expensive shop bought jam that I have never had to worry about its keeping qualities.

Should you find that it hasn't set particularly well, use it as a topping for icecream or pancakes; it will still taste delicious. Small quantities like this are also a good way to experiment with added flavours. Adding shreds of dark red rose petals (minus the little bitter white bit at the base) to raspberry jam and star anise or a piece of cinnamon stick to blackcurrant jam (remove these spices after the simmer stage just before the sugar goes in) have been very worthwhile. Have fun and make some wonderful 'artisan' jam.

Meanwhile I am off to make scones to go with my jam - before it all disappears. After all, it looks like summer is here.